


Blood Promise

by elle_stone



Series: Halloween Fright Fest 2018 [1]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, Halloween, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-27
Updated: 2018-10-27
Packaged: 2019-08-08 14:25:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16431140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elle_stone/pseuds/elle_stone
Summary: "All we want is to establish peaceful relations," Clarke assures him quickly. "That's why we're here. We want—we're thinking of moving our settlement. But we don't want to encroach upon anyone else's territory or make any enemies. We'd be happy to set up a trading relationship or any other amicable friendship between our groups—"But we'd settle for you not killing us, she thinks, just as the Grounder cuts her off."Not many pass by this part of the woods at night," he says.Clarke and Raven encounter a new Grounder clan.





	Blood Promise

Two torches mark the entrance to the village. By their blazing orange glow, Clarke can make out a tall, closed, wooden gate, and a wall that stretches out into the darkness, but little else: no signs of light but for the fires that jump and flicker in the midnight gloom, no signs of life but for this structure that towers up from the earth.

For a long while now she's been able to see only what the Rover's headlights show, as they splash their weak yellow light on the old, uneven roads, the underbrush. The sun sets so early in the cool Earth months. Travel is slow. And this, now, is as far as the Rover's battery will take them tonight; it won't charge again until morning, and then perhaps only slowly, if this pattern of cool, wet, cloudy days wears on.

She eases into park and climbs down out of the driver’s seat. The night is not quiet: she hears the drip-drip of old rain-water from the remaining tree leaves, and the deep-dark chirping of unknown insects. Still the slam of her car door, and the off-rhythm of Raven's door shutting a moment after, disturb a certain uncanny stillness that she cannot name. 

They walk over a carpet of rainslick red leaves, carefully, each step a purposeful testing of the ground, until they reach the gate. Then they glance at each other. Raven leans heavy on her stronger leg. She takes a deep breath, and tilts her head back, like she's looking for the stars behind the gray hoard of clouds, but really she's searching out the top of the gate, signs of lookouts, or archers, or the glint of poised spears.

"Not like they're expecting us," Clarke says, her voice pitched just above a whisper. She means, _I guess we'll have to knock_.

But Raven answers, "Not like they're expecting anyone." She sounds hoarse, a little broken: like she's speaking in a lower tone than she'd intended, voicing a secret she had meant to keep. In the low silence that follows, the Rover's headlights flicker out.

*

The Grounder who opens the gate for them is tall and thin, and for a long moment, he does not speak. Clarke does not speak, either, because the sight of his gaunt, angular face distracts her from the speech she has practiced so carefully over three long days and two lonely nights of travel. She's wondering if it's just the play of shadows on his skin or if there really are dark circles shaded there, in the deep hollows underneath his eyes.

Raven reaches over and squeezes her arm.

"We visit you from Arkadia," Clarke says, then. She's spoken too loudly and too suddenly. The Grounder's eyebrow twitches. "As friends." She repeats the message in Trig, careful to enunciate each word, because she's not sure that she'll remember the syllables just right.

The Grounder only stares at them. He carries no weapons. Perhaps, Clarke thinks, he speaks neither language, and perhaps he does not attack because they are clearly no threat. She flicks her gaze over his shoulder and sees an orderly row of wooden houses, and a variety of pale strangers, walking, gathering sometimes together, continuing along on their way. More people than she would expect to be out at this time of night. The streets are lined with torches, which send patterns of outsized shadows over the houses and into the streets.

"We have never heard of Arkadia," the Grounder answers, then. He speaks English, and though his words are slow and steady, Clarke senses that it's his native tongue. 

"We're new," Raven says, before Clarke can speak. "And independent. Not part of the alliance."

The Grounder tilts his head, curious, then says, "Neither are we. Nor do we wish to become so encumbered."

"All we want is to establish peaceful relations," Clarke assures him quickly. "That's why we're here. We want—we're thinking of moving our settlement. But we don't want to encroach upon anyone else's territory or make any enemies. We'd be happy to set up a trading relationship or any other amicable friendship between our groups—"

 _But we'd settle for you not killing us_ , she thinks, just as the Grounder cuts her off.

"Not many pass by this part of the woods at night," he says. 

"Yeah, well, we meant to get here earlier," Raven starts to explain. Her tone is too harsh for Clarke's liking, though she understands, understands that the long hours sitting haven't been good for her, understands her frustrations with the Rover's slow starts and long stops beneath the endless cloudy sky—but the Grounder barely seems to hear her, or care.

"I can bring you to Bram," he interrupts. His voice is still smooth and unbothered. If he is curious about the newcomers, he barely shows it. As he leads them into the village, the doors close behind them with a smooth, quiet hush, and the people in the streets look up, and watch them with deep-set, quiet eyes.

*

They sit together, side by side, on a hard-packed bare earthen floor, in the center of the biggest cabin at the end of the village's main street. Low fires flicker at the edges of the room. Clarke's heart is beating hard against her ribs, but this is a sort of fear that she is used to: the beat-beat of the unknown. She calms herself with the reminder that they come sincerely and in peace. Also, she knows that Raven has at least three knives hidden on her person, and that no one has made even a gesture to pat them down or search them since they stepped in through the front gate.

Across from them sits Bram, taller than the first Grounder, his skin ivory-pale and his eyes all but impossible to track, even to find, in the uneven light. They are deep black, the irises wide, and they never seem to settle where Clarke thinks they should. She feels a thin, spidery movement against her wrist and starts to jerk it away. Then realizes that the sensation is only Raven's fingers, reaching out blindly for her fingers. She takes Raven's hand and gives it a squeeze.

"I was surprised," Bram is telling them, "to hear that we had visitors. Perhaps Jonathan told you: that is so rare for us." He seems, perhaps, to smile. "You must have been traveling a long time. We like to keep to ourselves. Mostly."

That, yes, that is a smile.

Clarke scrambles for the right words. When she breathes in, her lungs stutter, and she's unsure if her legs could support her if she stood.

"And," he continues, "forgive me for saying—but you look so strange."

Raven makes a sound low in her throat, like she's biting back a low and rueful laugh, and Clarke nudges at her with her knee.

"I mean, you do not dress like any other clan we have ever met. And you said you are new." He blinks slowly, and when he opens his eyes, they settle on Clarke's face, and she sees for just a moment their true color and shape. "No one new has come to this part of the world for...over a hundred years. Times have changed indeed."

"You don't know the half of it," Raven says under her breath, and Clarke jumps in:

"We don't mean to disturb you, of course. And we apologize again for arriving in the middle of the night." The apology tastes dry and dusty on her tongue. She has an idea what the village would like in the quiet stillness of the day. "As we said to Jonathan—"

"I know why you're here," Bram says, with a short, dismissive wave of his hand. "We will not trouble you, and we understand you do not wish to trouble us. Newcomers—" He addresses them, then pauses, seems amused for a second at the novelty of the word. "Among your people, do you make promises?"

Clarke hesitates. She slides her fingers through Raven's fingers. Her palm against Raven's palm. "We do," she says.

"So do we," he answers. "Promises we take very seriously." He holds out his hand, palm out. Across the center are four thin, white scars: long-healed, eternal, ghostly pale. "Blood promises. Do you know anything of the importance of blood?" He lingers on the word _importance_ , as if the taste of it gave him pleasure, but lets the word _blood_ pass by, thin and weightless. Little more than a whisper.

Clarke nods simply, keeps herself steady. She tries to avoid staring directly at his face. "I'm a doctor. I’d say I understand the importance of blood fairly well."

"Yes—transfusions," Bram answers, the last word slick and dirty and low. "You lose too much of your blood and you die. And how easy it is to lose. How much just the sight of it seems to scare so many of your people."

"You don't know our people," Raven reminds him. "You've never met us, before now."

Bram tilts his head slowly, all the way to the side, and then back. He does not answer, except at last to say, "But I don't think either of you are afraid."

Clark hesitates, then admits, "We've both seen a bit too much of it for our liking."

"Mmmm, yes." He hums, thoughtful—reaches for Clarke's hand, but she pulls away. Bram seems unbothered. "Warriors. For a long time, people in the forests have been fighting as they had not fought for many years before. We will leave you in peace. You've come to us as guests and... as I said, that is so very rare. But our promises are not given lightly." He reaches out his hand again, this time only an offer, the palm face up and the four even, overlapping lines clear and cool in the firelight. 

"A blood oath," he says, "cannot be broken."

Clarke can hear, as if from a distance, Raven telling her that they should go. But where will they go? The woods are deep and dark, a tangle of bare, fallen branches and jumbles of leaves; the Rover is dead, and won't come alive for hours yet. But more than that, more than these practical thoughts, she understands. She feels the tug of Raven's hand in her hand but all it does is remind her of the calm and soothing strength of an unbreakable, a sacred bond. Her heartbeat has slowed. Her breathing is calm. Earth has been so uncertain and so fragile and finding the time-tested true core of it has been a struggle beyond any of her tiny battles and this: she trusts this.

She trusts the sharp cut, the slick rush of pain. She trusts the slow rise of red to the surface. A life line. The start of a scar.

Later, the moment when palm presses to palm fades away, the memory scattered with the breaking of a trance. But she recalls in perfect detail, for the rest of her life, the moment after: her palm still burning, holding her hand in a fist, watching Bram lick her blood from his palm and his eyelids gently falling closed.

*

They spend the night alone in a bed of thick furs, laid out on the floor, three small candles their only light. 

"I don't think that was a good idea," Raven reminds her, yet again, but Clarke is staring at the raw, red wound on her palm, and barely hears her.

"Well, it's done," she says. "They won't harm us now."

"You think they would have harmed us if you hadn't—?"

"I don't know." She really doesn't, but she also does not mind, anymore, admitting her own uncertainty. "Maybe. Maybe not now. Maybe not soon." She sets her hand down at last and turns on her side, props herself up on one elbow and looks down at Raven, lying next to her. She's taken her hair down. It falls over her shoulders in unruly dark tangles, frames the concerned, pensive expression on her face.

"But they know who we are now," Clarke adds. "And you heard what he said. They've waited a long time for someone new."

Raven doesn't answer for a long moment. Her gaze scans slowly across Clarke's face, trying to read her, reaching out again to test their knowledge of each other, one more time. She does not seem entirely convinced. How many promises, she might ask, have they seen broken? How many have they broken themselves? How many alliances have failed? How many times has their integrity been weakened? How many times have they struggled with themselves?

She reaches out and traces her fingertip along the chain around Clarke's neck, down, slowly, to the gold ring at the end. One promise at least, made with fervor, piously kept. Clarke bows her head and presses her nose against Raven's neck. She slips her finger through the ring Raven wears on an identical thin golden chain. She twists it around her finger. She breathes in deep of Raven's familiar scent.

*

The next day, the Rover is where they left it. The village is quiet. No one offers them goodbyes. Clarke climbs up into the passenger's seat, and Raven behind the wheel. When she turns on the engine, it clunks awkwardly, mercifully, to life, and Raven turns them around and drives them off, beneath a pale blue sky, the path ahead lit by rays of weak October light.  

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! 
> 
> This story has an accompanying moodboard [on my tumblr](http://kinetic-elaboration.tumblr.com/post/179259110115/blood-promise-princess-mechanic-2000-words).


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